ABSTRACT
The history of an explicit curriculum (Davies, 2005a) in youth work is paralleled with a focus on accountability. This began (as we saw in Chapter 1) with the original attempts to introduce ‘a core curriculum’ by Howarth in 1989 (NYB, 1990). This was the initial impact on youth work of the educational reforms introduced by the Thatcher government. As argued in Chapter 1, the original antipathy to the explicit introduction of curriculum into youth work at the time was caused by the realisation among youth workers that they would not be accountable on their terms (Ord, 2004a). This continued under the influence of New Labour (as we saw in Chapter 13) where the Transforming Youth Work agenda introduced a product based curriculum model, programmed work and outcome driven practice. This is continuing despite the cuts with the introduction of ‘social impact bonds’, a system of payment by results where funding is only supplied if ‘certain social outcomes, such as reducing reoffending or gaining employment, are achieved (Offord, 2015c).
